WEBVTT
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This program is designed to provide general information with regards
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to the subject matters covered. This information is given with
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the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station
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are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial, legal, counseling,
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professional service, or any advice.
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You should seek the services.
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Of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas.
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At the end of the day, it's not about what
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you have or even what you've accomplished. It's about what
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you've done with those accomplishments. It's about who you've lifted up,
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who you've made better. It's about what you've given back.
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Denzel Washington, welcome to inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is
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to elevate the lives of others and to inspire you
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to do the same.
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Kat Newport, how are you.
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I'm doing really great, Doctor Doug, how are you?
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Welcome to the show, And you know, in so many ways,
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I'm so happy to be back in the US. Like
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it's ten o'clock here or ten thirty and in the morning,
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and normally I'm doing it at six or seven in
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the morning or seven or eight at night, So this
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is great to be to be here.
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Regular daytime hours.
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There you go, yes, amen, So I'm interested. I always
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love the backstory of what brings an individual to the
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point that they're at now where obviously for you you've
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written your book and you can talk a little bit
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about that, but also how you got to the point
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where you're really doing things to make a difference in
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people's lives.
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So I started my corporate career a long time ago,
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like thirty years. I hate saying that, you feel terribly terrible,
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but yeah, I worked in the corporate world for thirty
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years in a leadership capacity. And what I did notice
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when I walked into corporate is relationships are so important
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and trying to figure out how to work with those relationships,
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particularly when there's a whole bunch of different perspectives floating around.
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No we should go this way, No we should go
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that way. And my skill set in this regard was
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not always the best. So over the course of my career,
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trying to figure out how to manage conflict, how to
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manage relationships in a workplace environment, spilled over into writing
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my books More Conflict. I became an accredited coach with
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the International Coaching Federation. I'm a certified change manager. If
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you want some conflict, try to change something in a
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corporate environment. And I work with families as well who
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are working on estate planning and estate management. A lot
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of conflict and choices that have to be made in
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that highly stressful environment. So really wanting to bring peace
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from discord and stepping into that space where I can
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be that conduit.
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Oh fantastic, And certainly in today's world, conflict resolution has
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got to be one of the most important topics we
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could really talk about or learn in so many dynamics.
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I mean, you've got your family dynamics, you have your
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work dynamics, you have your societal dynamics. So why is
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conflict so different and difficult for so many people?
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Oh? Where do we begin? So human beings are social creatures,
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and anything that kind of brings us outside of that
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harmony and that social accord and that social comfort is
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very threatening. The brain kind of takes it is, Oh,
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my gosh, I'm going to be kicked out of the
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group and I'm going to die in the woods and
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get eaten by a bear. Not that that really happens
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very much anymore, but it does trigger that. That's so
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preservation piece in the human in the Human psychep. Number one,
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number two. We've been gathering skills on how to manage
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conflict since we first drew breath, so very very much
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from the moment we entered our families, we've been taught
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how to manage conflict for good or for ill, No
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judgment on my part, but we do have these conflict
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habits that we've built up over time that continually kind
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of play out unless we become aware of them and
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start figuring out which ones are good for us and
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which ones might need a little work to get us
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to where we want to go in our goals. So
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there's a couple of games at play here, okay.
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And so as you say, there's when we talk about
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conflict resolution, many of us have been taught a positive
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way and many of us have been taught a not
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so positive way for conflict resolution, as you say, And
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you know what I find interesting is when you talk
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about conflict it goes to some real depths as far
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as I can understand, because if you say something to
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me that triggers me, then we all of a sudden
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have a conflict. But the question that is even maybe
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more important in my mind is why did I get triggered?
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And do you find do you find that that aspect
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of conflict, as far as really delving into the emotions
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and the emotional reaction to an event or to a
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comment or whatever, plays an important role.
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Love that you brought this forward. It's in Smart Conflict,
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it's in the book. But when we're in a conflict
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moment and we get triggered per se, or something comes
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up for us, or we get that emotional reaction, what
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our brain is actually doing is trying to predict what
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happens next. We are not living in the moment discussing
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our difference of perspective, our difference of opinion. What the
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brain has done is gone, oh my gosh, I've had
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a discussion like this before. This is exactly like that situation,
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and it's never ever going to happen again, So I'm
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going to react in this way that happened before, so
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it doesn't happen again again. It's that self preservation. So
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instead of being present in the moment in control of
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that emotional reaction, we can sometimes get a little carried
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away with the oh my gosh moment of it, that
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triggering piece.
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Well, and you know, I know that there's so many
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dynamics to this whole thing of conflict because you've got
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the emotional response, which I think is big. Another thing
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that I have always, you know, really found very fascinating
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and somewhat humorous but actually very true, is that there's
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somewhere within us where we have to be right. So
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you know, if you say something to me and I
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immediately let those emotions come up, and I get triggered,
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and now I'm going to give you my opinion, and
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quite frankly, you know what, I am always right and therefore,
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and you know, potentially you're gonna if it's not you,
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you know you're going to go, well, here's my emotional reaction,
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and I'm always right, and all of a sudden you
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have this huge conflict.
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Absolutely absolutely, conflict is relational. So where there are two people,
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there will be conflict, and it's important to keep focus
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on that relationship. So if you must be right and
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I must be right, we're not focused on the relationship.
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If you're going to be right at all costs, what
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is that exactly going to cost you? What does the
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relationship with me look like after you've put your flag
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in the sand and said, I am right, and I
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am not moving. What does the future for us look like?
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So when in conflict, be very aware of that relationship,
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be it in a family dynamic, your partner, your children, whatever,
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or in a workplace environment. If you've got to work
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with Sally from accounting for the next however long you're
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with this company, you probably want to put some investment
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in that relationship. So it's not always a prickly relationship.
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Well and you mentioned yeah, and that's true, And I
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think you know what I what I found is I've
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you know, coached different smaller companies. One of the first
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things I would say is what we're going to teach
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you here from a standpoint a model of management and
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success is so applicable in your personal life. And sometimes
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we went back and forth because obviously personal life affects
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business and business effects personal But as you talk about
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as you talk about family, for instance, what do you
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what do you find is the greatest cause of conflict
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within a family. And we can talk about the couple themselves,
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you know, the significant other and the married couple, and
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then we can talk about the children and the children
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conflict within themselves, and then the conflict between the parents
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and the child. There's three questions.
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Well, you just stuck it them right over here. Okay,
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I think very much the answer You've already put it
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into our conversation. If I have to be right with
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my partner all the time, that's going to cause conflicts.
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I'm your mother, and I said, so there's there's that
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power dynamic again, there's conflict. I'm not engaging with the
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relationship with my child. Why is it you want to
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have peanut butter and jelly sandwich at ten o'clock at night,
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Now that you've woken up, you know there's no engagement
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at that point in that relationship. It's I'm in the
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I'm in the seat of authority, and you're going to
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do what I tell you. I think when I'm looking
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at these social medias and you see the little videos,
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I'm going to go start a fight with my partner
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because I'm bored. Just drives me right up the wall.
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Conflict has a purpose. It brings us together. It helps
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us think outside the box because we're looking at different
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perspectives and moves us towards the future. So really understanding
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that and the purpose of conflict is not to beat
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the other one down, is not to put the other
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one in a box, is not to control the situation,
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but it's to grow and move and expand it really
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takes some of the sting of the word conflict in
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of itself.
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Well, and you make an interesting point. There are two
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different types of conflict. There's a healthy conflict and there's
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an unhealthy conflict. And if I'm understanding you correctly, that
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unhealthy conflict is when the emotions come in and I'm
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right and you're wrong, and all of that goes on,
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whereas if a conflict, quote a conflict, which is a
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healthy one comes up and you're right. The word conflict
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always has a negative connotation here, but as you're talking
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about the positive connotation that if you and I have
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a conflict, and if we're open to understanding why you're
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thinking this way, and you're open to my thoughts and
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we have that communication. I have found in many instances
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is all of a sudden, if I'm sitting and really
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listening and not always constantly trying to think what I'm
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going to say next, which is the negative conflict, I
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find that I gain some really important and valuable points
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that I hadn't thought of before.
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Absolutely absolutely. When I'm working with organizations, I always bring
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in that let's think outside the box mentality. It's really
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hard to think outside the box when the only perspective
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you're willing to look at is your own. You're really
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tight in that box. Thinking outside the box requires the
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entertainment of other perspectives, of alternate solutions, and the best
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way to do that is actively listen and have that
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communication with the people around you. And this happens at
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home as well. You know, when you're with your partner,
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where are we going to go on vacation? Well? I
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want to go to Cancirn. Well I want to go
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to Alaska. You know, how does this work? Trying to
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figure out what's best for the entire group? That relationship
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piece super important.
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Well, and you're kind of talking about it now, But
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I guess the next question I have is how do
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you go how do you go from that unhealthy conflict
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type of thing to a healthy one, and how do
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you do that as an individual? Because again, as we
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talked about this, this is family, this is work, this
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is societal. How does an individual get to the point
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where they can go from unhealthy conflict to healthy conflict
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number one, and I'm going to go to a baser
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question before that. Okay, how do we deal with helping
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an individual to realize that they are constantly creating a
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healthy conflict for them? And then if they can finally
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identify that, then how do they go to a healthy conflict?
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When looking at conflict, the reflection should always start with self,
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look at what you're bringing into the situation. The Smart
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Conflict is the title of the book is actually based
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off a workshop where smart is an acronym that helps
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you sort of unpack the unhealthy part of conflict and
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restructure it into more healthy conflict. And you start at
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the esk, which is really understanding the situation. I've been
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in this kind of environment before, where we're having this
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this very heated discussion. Let's put am very heated discussion,
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and we are talking about two totally different things, and
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we don't quite realize that till we're about halfway through, going, oh,
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wait a minute, wait a second, we have two different
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things going on here, or possibly more so, really understanding
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the core of the situation. What are you in conflict about?
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What has got your emotions so fired up? Because it's
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not necessarily your partner leaving the cap off the toothpaste tube.
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That's got you all fired up. This is the straw
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that broke the camel's back. There's something else that's going on.
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People don't get divorced over toothpaste. People get divorced over
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a lack of consideration, a lack of understanding, a lack